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The Grapevine (9/9/16): The Ballad of Paige and Alberto

Good morning, and this is your daily Grapevine! This section of Smark Henry is where we round up all the founded and unfounded rumors abound the pro wrestling scene that you may have missed over the evening.

Some big news on the WWE's under-fire power couple:

Paige is hiring a lawyer to get out of her three-year WWE contract, while Alberto del Rio will be holding a press conference in Mexico City to discuss his future. The wrestler couple, which has reportedly been internally attacked by the WWE for being in a relationship with each other, are each looking to leave the company after being both suspended for their first WWE Wellness Policy violations. Rumored harassment includes splitting them up in the WWE Draft, Head of Talent Relations Mark Carrano telling them both to break up, and WWE threatening to fire Paige if she didn't break up with del Rio, all of which WWE is obviously denying. It's very likely that del Rio is leaving, as he has more freedom to leave, but Paige will apparently be figuring out how to go as well. (Source: WON)

We say: This is supremely petty on the WWE's part, sabotaging their own product with this childish behavior. Regardless of whether their concerns over Paige and del Rio's relationship are valid, the mere rumor of the company threatening to fire Paige because of it is not a good PR move in an era where they're always looking for good PR. Karma always comes back around, fellas—one would think they'd already know about this.

Smark Henry has it on good authority that today's WWE Manila meet and greet session will be with Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson. Meanwhile, Charlotte and Cesaro will be doing media interviews.

We say: Bullet Club fans, now's your chance!

Sasha Banks's "bad news" promo on RAW this week reportedly upset some people backstage. Apparently, they felt that using the injury to set up the swerve that Sasha—who is recovering from some nagging back injuries—wasn't retiring was a little too insensitive considering the real-life career-threatening injuries to guys like Daniel Bryan, Tyson Kidd, and Edge, all of whom are well-liked backstage. Although the blueprint for the segment was Mark Henry's famous "retirement" promo to kickstart his feud with John Cena back in 2013, Henry wasn't "retiring" because of an injury. For what it's worth, people seem to be more upset with Creative for going that route, not Sasha. (Source: WON)

We say: We understand the concern coming from them, but what happened to real life being the best material for promos? We mean, the segment wasn't that great, but it did kind of make sense to do that. Perhaps it just needed to be executed better.

Cody Rhodes is still apparently fighting for the right to use the "Rhodes" name on TV. Cody, whose family's last name is Runnels in real life, has managed to use it in non-TV matches, such as PWG's Battle of Los Angeles this year and EVOLVE 66 and 67. He wants to pursue angles in TNA, ROH, and NJPW, which are all televised products and will be an obstacle to using the Rhodes name, which WWE currently has the merchandise rights to. The defense will have to lie on the Rhodes name being used long before Dusty worked in the WWE. (Source: WON)

We say: Typical WWE. We wish Cody the best of luck in this little battle, and hope he doesn't have to resort to using some other name.